Lear, King | Paul A. Jorgensen (essay date 1967)
Paul A. Jorgensen (essay date 1967)
SOURCE: "Is Man No More Than This?," in Lear's Self-Discovery, University of California Press, 1967, pp. 115-35.
[In the following excerpt, which traces Lear's increasing self-discovery, Jorgensen focuses on Lear's views of female sexuality, which bring him to a fuller understanding of human nature.]
ARE YOU OUR DAUGHTER?
Lear's education in the nature of man is … not confined to the theme of "The art of our necessities." There are several insights, more or less separate from this theme, which help answer the question "Is man no more than this?" One thinks immediately of one of Lear's first recognitions that man is limited by his body. When Cornwall will not admit him, Lear breaks off his anger with the reflection that the Duke may not be well: "nature, being oppress'd, commands the mind / To suffer with the body" (II.iv.109-110). A comparable, though reversed, relationship of mind and body...
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